Top-posting is when you put your reply to a post above the quoted
text, as seen here:
--

It's spelt "Cthulu", IIRC.

Yast <yast@aglami.com> wrote:

All top-posters should be disembowelled!

I agree with this post.

Me too. And after the disembowelling, their bodies should be

sacrificed to Satan.

Wouldn't C'fulu be more appreciative?

--

2) Why shouldn't I top-post?

i) Continuity

During a long thread on a newsgroup, several conversations can
develop, therefore it's necessary for people to have a bit of quoted
text when reading messages in order for them to get the context of the
replies. With any normal, healthy newsgroup, consisting entirely of
bottom-posters, such a thread, properly edited, would look like this:
--

Frook <frook@aglami.com> wrote:

Yes, I do believe in some kind of God.

The concept of God is just a useless relic of an outmoded belief

system.

I disagree. Even if there is no actual 'God' that can be defined in

physical terms,

the concept of God and the church can be a metaphor for the kind of

caring society

that we should try to achieve.

Ridiculous. How do you justify the Church's claim that black people

were soulless,

merely as a way of justifying slavery? Religion is just a way of

keeping the masses

under control.

Waah! Shut up!

--
As you can see, the conversation is easy to follow and readable.
However, were this group to consist of top-posters, the same
conversation would look like this:
--

Waah! Shut up!

Frook <frook@aglami.com> wrote:

Ridiculous. How do you justify the Church's claim that black people

were soulless,

merely as a way of justifying slavery? Religion is just a way of

keeping the masses

under control.

I disagree. Even if there is no actual 'God' that can be defined in

physical terms,

the concept of God and the church can be a metaphor for the kind of

caring society

that we should try to achieve.

The concept of God is just a useless relic of an outmoded belief

system.

Yes, I do believe in some kind of God.

--
Unless you speak a variant of English which involves reading from
bottom to top, the thread is difficult to follow and makes little
contextual sense.
--

ii) Ease of editing

People, as you may have noticed, are faulty. Sometimes, in the
adrenaline rush which accompanies posting to a thread on Usenet, they
forget to edit their headers and the quoted text. (The header is the
part of the message which states who wrote the most recently quoted
piece of text - for example, "Frook <frook@aglami.com> wrote:".)
Eventually you end up with a whole screen full of who wrote what, and
quoted text going a long way back; it's unnecessary, unsightly,
inconvenient and encourages the spread of infectious diseases. Of
course, when somebody who has fully operational common-sense glands
comes along and wishes to reply, they usually edit out the headers and
excess text and the good citizens of the newsgroup sleep safely in
their beds again. Of course, the people who do this editing are kind,
gentle folk, and we should try to aid them in every way possible.
People who post at the bottom of messages make this very easy; an
unedited thread would look something like this:
--

Frook <frook@aglami.com> wrote:

Yast <yast@aglami.com> wrote:

Frook <frook@aglami.com> wrote:

A. Looney <not@home.com> wrote:

Jesus <son@god.com> wrote:

Foghorn Leghorn <babababoy@warner.com> wrote:

Textual intercourse is the most fun you'll ever have.

I forgive thee all.

You're going to get your head kicked in.

No, we're all pacifists in here.

And anarchists.

And athiests.

Yes, let's lose the Jesus guy, shall we?

--
As you can see, all the good, kind person has to do is highlight all
of the headers except their own and a reasonable part of the quoted
text below it and hit delete. Not so on a group full of top-posters.
The same thread would look like this:
--

Yes, let's lose the Jesus guy, shall we?

Frook <frook@aglami.com> wrote:

And athiests.

Yast <yast@aglami.com>

And anarchists.

Frook <frook@aglami.com> wrote:

No, we're all pacifists in here.

A. Looney <not@home.com> wrote:

You're going to get your head kicked in.

Jesus <son@god.com> wrote:

I forgive thee all.

Foghorn Leghorn <babababoy@warner.com> wrote:

Textual intercourse is the most fun you'll ever have.

--
Editing the headers is now far more difficult, since you have to
highlight them individually and delete them. The same is true for the
overquoting of the text. Therefore, most people will end up not
bothering with editing, or deleting the whole collection of quoted
text and headers, losing all of the contextual information. Idiocy,
and a kind that can be so easily avoided.
--

3) The Laziness Defence

"But it's too much effort to put replies at the bottom!" (said in a
whiny monotone)

Now that's just silly. Do you eat meat raw because it's too much
effort to cook it? Do you urinate wherever you're sitting because it's
too much effort to get up and go to the bathroom? I only know one
person who does these things, and Atob's not a top-poster. Seriously,
though, as shown in the earlier examples, by not bothering to put your
replies at the bottom, you're just causing other people problems when
replying, so why not put in that extra bit of effort? It's not too
difficult to push the <Page Down> key, is it? (Don't answer
that, it's rhetorical.)